Thursday, May 5, 2011

The Impact Of 205 Million Gallons Of Oil Lost In The Gulf Of Mexico

On April 20th 2010, 205 million gallons of oil began flowing into the gulf of Mexico. For 3 months we strongly debated our crippling dependency on oil. But what if the explosion never happened?

What would we have done with all that oil?*46% would have been processed into gasoline, enough fuel for 750,000 cars to drive from New York to Los Angeles.

*37 million gallons of this oil would've turned into diesel, that's enough fuel to keep one semi truck driving nonstop for 536 years.

Image: articulatedtruck.net

*16 million gallons would've been converted into jet fuel. That's enough to circle the globe over 3000 times on a large commercial plane.

*10 million gallons of this fuel would've been processed into 20,000 tonnes of plastic.

*6 million gallons would be used to create synthetic rubber, creating enough tires to replace all four wheels on every car in Buffalo, New York.

Image: auto.701panduan.com

The remaining oil has thousands of uses, from heating your house to paving roads, to creating the fibers in your sweater.

The full environmental consequences of this spill remain unknown, yet we do know how 205 million gallons of processed oil impacts our world.

*15,000 tonnes of plastic created would never be recycled.

*180,000 tonnes of the tires created would end up in landfills and the carbon dioxide emission created from the usage of oil would be over 1.6 million tonnes, requiring a forest the size of San Francisco to offset.

Image: teslamotorsclub.com

*The 205 million gallons of oil lost in the gulf is the same amount the United States consumes in less than 7 hours.

Carry a thermos, limit your trips to the store, or find transportation alternatives.